British Campaign for the Defence of Political Prisoners and Human Rights in Indonesia

T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

Tanjung Priok incident

Many shot dead by troops Well over two dozen people were shot dead and many more wounded when troops fired on demonstrators in Tanjung Priok who were demanding that the police release four people. Tempo (22 September) put the number killed at 28, while the Petititon­of-50 group in a statement (see below) said forty people died.

The event which occurred on 12 September was the climax to a series of incidents provoked by local police and army security officers. On 7 September, a mubalig (preacher) had made a sermon at the Rawa Badak mosque denouncing government policy, in particular, according to Tempo, land seizures, the family planning programme and the Societies Law (see page 2) . Leaflets were circulated and anti-government slogans were painted. on walls. The local security officer (babinsa) later came to the mosque and ordered the slogans to be painted out. When this was refused, he soaked paper in filthy gutter water and used this to black out the slogans himself. He further incensed feelings by entering the mosque in his muddy boots (shoes must be removed). As the angry crowd swelled, the security officer made a hasty retreat. Later police arrived to arrest four people.

The following Wednesday, a well-respected informal leader, Amir Biki, set up a street podium and spoke to a large crowd, repeating criticism of the government on a range of issues, and calling for the immediate release of the four detainees. After making this demand to the police later that evening by phone, a huge crowd gathered and marched to the police station. With the police beseiged, troop reinforcements arrived under helicopter cover. Eye-witnesses later described the scene that followed as resembling the scene of a battle. Troops shot at demonstrators; some according to Tempo were shot dead at close range. Among the first to fall was Amir Biki who had taken up a position in front of the crowd.

Murdani takes control The very next morning, General Murdani, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, summoned all editors in the capital and gave them his official version of the incident, making it clear that this was "first-hand information in accordance with the real incident". He admitted that troops had fired "in the direction of the mob" and that casualties were "inevitable". He claimed that there were nine deaths. His communique has been followed in the press by a wave of statements and resolutions praising him for acting with speed and decision so as to prevent "rumours and issues from spreading". There has not been a murmur of criti­cism though some organisations, such as the Indonesian Council of Ulamas (MUI) have not yet made any statement: it says that it has been "too pre-occupied" with other things.

Tanjung Priok is Jakarta's dockland where economic and social problems are serious:

Economically, (it is) not the worst off but work is irregular and life insecure. The country's imports have been down dramatically, re­ducing port employment , and recently the government has suddenly banned much stevedoring activity . .. There is also an ecological problem: fresh water is difficult and expensive to obtain in Tanjung Priok. (Far Eastern Economic Review, 27 September 1984.)

Many dockworkers and seamen in the area are from devout Muslim regions such as South Sulawesi, Madura and Banten, West Java. In the absence of channels for the expression of dis-

ur am eaving t e press conference soon after the Tanjung Priok incident, with Information Minister Harmoko (centre) and Major-General Try Soetrisno (right), Jakarta Military Commander.

The fight for democra.cy

content, people are turning increasingly to the mosque for lect­ures and discussion . Some mubalig (preachers) are making no effort to conceal their feelings. Mosques are organised on a local basis under Dewan Dakwah and in some places , these Dewan (councils) appear to be promoting criticism. The FEER article quoted above refers to a "remaja (youth) mosque movement" , largely uncoordinated, which is spreading radical thoughts , now that many younger Muslims have turned away from the estab­lished Muslim organisations that are subj ect to strong govern­ment pressure. Many in this movement see "Pancasila-as-a­single-principle" as a direct threat to religious freedom. Thus, the movement is not fundamentalist ; rather, it is concerned primarily with calling for democratic rights .

Army leaders from Murdani down are deary extremely worried about the repercussions if the idea spreads that the Army is waging a campaign against Islam. The Army Chief-of­Staff, General Rudini, on a visit to a pesantren (Muslim education centre) in East Java a week after the Tanjung Priok

Amir Biki Amir Biki's Funeral

incident said people "should avoid seeing the incident superficially which will create the impression that the Armed Forces are striking out against Islam ... "How can that be?" he said , "since I myself am a Muslim." Statements like that are not going to satisfy Muslims who fear the current drift of army policy.

Petition-of-SO condemns Murdani A statement issued by the Petition-of-50 group and published only abroad (NRC Handelsblad , 21 September) strongly con­demned , the ruthless crackdown on the Tanjung Priok demonstration and denounced Murdani for misleading the public. They called for an independent enquiry, and said that the crucial issue leading to the outburst is the lack of democracy and resentment against the Societies Law. One of their group is now in detention , Haji Fatwa, the Secretary; altogether twenty . people have been arrested, according to the group. Another familiar name among those arrested is Tony Ardie, the man who spoke out last year against the ban on schoolgirls wearing headscarves at school (see TAPOL bulletin No 61) .

"Save Democracy" pamphlet attacks the Five Laws

An illegal pamphlet entitled Save Democracy has been circulating in Indonesia since August. It accuses the Suharto regime of violating the Constitution and strongly attacks the Five Laws now before Parliament as the latest in its systematic campaign to render the Constitution meaningless. The publication, issued by the Lembaga Kesadaran Berkonstitusi (Institute for Constitutional Awareness) includes three articles., One is by Moh . Sanusi Hardjadinata of the Nationalist Party (PNI) and chairman of the government-enforced merger of nationalist and Christian parties, the POI, until he resigned in 1980 over government interference in POI internal affairs; one is by Moh. Natsir , chairman of the Masyumi Party (Muslim) in the 1950s; and one is by (retired) General Nasution. Thus the pamphlet includes the views of a "nationalist element", a "religious element" and an "Army" element (p.4)

Although the media is not allowed to make any reference to the publication, it is known to have aroused a great deal of

interest at a time when the Five Laws are shortly to h-.: enacted. The three writers · themselves in varying degret.s bear responsibility for the steady drift towards authoritarianism since the mid 1950s (parties of the left that were banned by the military in 1965 must also share some of that responsibility).

The inclusion of an article by General Nasutio.n is intended to emphasise that army elements are part of the developing coalition to oppose the present ruling forces . This highlights, however, a critical flaw in the coalition as a force for the democracy since it acknowledges the role of the military (in the person of a retired general) in political and state affairs thus accepting the legitimacy of the dwi-fungsi (dual-function) of the Armed Forces , the principle that is the very essence of Indonesian militarism. Moreover, in his article, Nasution admits that it was under his leadership that the army in 1958 pressed for the restoration of the 1945 Constituion now in force a Constitution which provides the basis for authoritarianism. Well

2 T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

may he attack (p.69) the present regime for enforcing a system of appointing Armed Forces representatives as members of Parliament, yet it was he who first insisted on this in 1958 as a member of President Sukarno's National Council, and it was under his pressure that Sukarno's reconstituted Parliament, set up in 1960 to replace the elected Parliament of 1955, included 35 appointees from the Armed Forces as MPs. For these reasons, Nasution's contribution does not merit consideration as part of a document on saving democracy.

* Sanusi Hardhadinata takes a look at the way the general elections held in 1971, 1977 and 1982 have been effectively manipulated by the regime, creating as a result a legislative body "that provides the cover for autocracy and oligarchy so that the political forces managing the state can give the impression of democracy" (p .21) . He accepts that "autocratic tendencies" displayed after the inception of Suharto's New Order in 1965 were "understandable" thus placing himself on the side of the 1965-6 massacres and the destruction of one whole section of political expression . His strong complaint is that, since conditions have "returned to normal", nothing has been done to restore democracy. He attacks the Five Laws for "perpetuating autocracy" or even leading to "totalitarianism" . Sanusi argues that as defined by Sukarno, Pancasila should only be the ideology of the state, not of the political parties. As Sanusi sees it, Pancasila as a state ideology must permit different ideologies to flourish (though not those ideologies that "threaten" Pancasila). The Societies Law and obligatory acceptance of Pancasila by all organisations is thus seen as the death-knell to a system of regulated political activity that he himself was part of until he resigned from the POI in 1980.

* Moh. Natsir starts by stressing the contribution of 'Muslim followers' to the military takeover in 1965 when, he argues, "all groups, shoulder-to~shoulder, confronted the threat facing the state" . He goes on to prove his point by saying that "Colonel (now Lieutenant-General) Sarwo Edhie, then commander of the RPKAD (paracommandos) spoke about the spontaneous participation of all strata and groups while he was carrying out his heavy duties in Central and East Java1 and elsewhere". The late General Ali Murtopo, he continues, "did not hesitate to contact Prawoto Mangkusasmito (Muslim leader) to discuss recruiting Muslim youths to reinforce his intelligence apparatus in Central Java" (p.41). Thus he sees the years of violent political extermination as "our honeymoon period" with the New Order regime (p.42).

But he goes on to describe the stage~by-stage regimentation of political life. First, the 1971 general elections secured a predominant position for the Armed Forces and its political party, GOLKAR. Then followed the forced merger of the seven political parties existing in 1973 after attempts to re-establish his own party, the Masyumi had been decisively rejected by Suharto. But at this stage, the two remaining parties were still permitted to advocate their own ideologies, though the Muslim Party PPP, was prohibited from using the word "Islam" in its name.

Based on the proportional strengths of GOLKAR and the two non-government political parties in the present DPR and MPR, he points out that in future, 6002 out of the 1,000 seats in the MPR (the body which elects the president and lays down state policy) will be appointees:

Armed Forces MPR Armed Forces Regional deputies Group deputies From GOLKAR and the 2 other parties

100 (from the DPR)

100 193 to 200 100

100 to 107

600

With some 250 DPR seats in GOLKAR hands (246 seats in the present DPR of 460 seats) GOLKAR and the Armed Forces will

thus control 85 per cent of all MPR seats. The stage-by-stage attack on independent political parties

went a step further with two speeches by Suharto in early 1980 warning that political parties were displaying an unwillingness to accept Pancasila as their ideology. It was this that led a group of individuals to issue a statement of concern which subsequently came to be known as the "Petition-of-Fifty". Leaders of the five main religious councils (for the Protestants, the Catholics, the Muslims, the Hindus and the Buddhists) also met and issued a statement drawing attention to the right of these bodies and their respective social organisations to base themselves on their own religious beliefs. But even so, the MPR session adopted a policy decree in 1982 requiring all parties, organisations and groupings to accept Pancasila as their sole ideological basis. The Societies Law as now drafted, writes Natsir, is the realisation of our very worst fears .

He finally complains bitterly about the total absence of social control, the heavy hand of press censorship, the "hot-line" linking the army's security force, Kopkamtib, and the Information Ministry with all editors telling them what they may and may not publish, and the constant surveillance of sermons in the mosques . "The farther one goes from the capital, the greater is the fear to express opinions ." (p.57) .

Footnotes 1. The massacres were the most severe in these two provinces . 2. Parliament (DPR) will consist of 400 elected members and 100 Armed Forces appointees . All DPR members sit in the MPR, plus 500 appointees as itemised in this table.

---------THE FIVE LAWS--------.

Since the end of August, the Indonesian Parliament has been discussing a package of Five Draft Laws concerning:

1. The political parties and GOLKAR. 2. The general elections. 3. The composition and status of Parliament (DPR) , the Upper Chamber (MPR), and the Regional Assemblies (DPRD) . 4. Societies . 5. A referendum. The first two are little more than amendments to

existing laws, further tightening government control. The third law increases the seats in the DPR to 500 and in the MPR to 1,000. The Societies Law introduces a whole new range of restrictions on all social organisations, including the requirement that they adopt Pancasila as their sole ideology (see TAPOL Bulletin No 64, July 1984). The fifth law stipulates that any amendment to the country's Constitution may only be adopted by means of a referendum, the intention being to rule out any chance of the Constitution ever being amended, even though the composition of the legislative bodies already makes that certain .

The contents of all these laws have been widely publicised since drafts were reproduced by two Jakarta dailies in June. Although there is evidence of much disquiet, none of this has found expression in the press, except for cautious statements made by leading Protestant and Catholic figures in Sinar Harapan (18 June). No one doubts that the Laws will be passed by acclamation. The PPP, the only party that might have made a last-ditch effort to resist some of the more devastating features of the laws, has been completely paralysed as the result of John Naro's coup de grace (see item on page 4).

The Five Laws take the military regime yet a step further forward, effectively completing its stranglehold on political activity and eliminating the last remaining semblances of democratic rights . Perhaps the most important repercussion will be the shattering of any remaining illusions that the organisational structures set up by the military since the late 1960s can be used to press for the restoration of democracy.

T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 3

PPP abandons Islam The Partai Persatuan Pembangunan (Development Unity Party) which came into being in 1973 as the result of a government­enforced merger of the four Muslim parties existing at the time has now completely abandoned its Islamic principles . The PPP Congress held in August adopted the Pancasila as its sole belief. This conforms with government-dictated policy, soon to be enacted in the Societies' Law (see TAPOL Bulletin No. 64, July 1984), that all organisations and parties are required to have no other ideology than Pancasila. The PPP now describes itself as an "open party" which means that Muslim and non-Muslim alike can join .

The August Congress, the first ever to be held in the PPP's history, was orchestrated and controlled by John Naro, the man now in undisputed control of the party's leading organs. Formerly a public prosecutor believed to have had connections with the underworld, Naro became part of General Ali Murtopo's "special operations" unit (OPSUS), and played an active role in Parmusi, the Muslim party set up in the late 1960s after the Suharto regime had refused to permit Masjumi, the party outlawed by President Sukarno, to re-establish itself.

The methods used by Naro to manipulate the Congress at will have been widely reported in the Indonesian press and can only anger Muslims who until now have regarded the PPP as a vehicle for Muslim aspirations. "It was," writes Tempo (25 August, 1984), "Naro's Congress . He had everything tied up. From the moment he met President Suharto on 14 June and announced afterwards that the President would address the opening session of the Congress, it was clear that he was in control and had the President's blessing." Sinar Harapan (11 September 1984) also stresses that Naro stage-managed the Congress with government support and legitimisation.

Naro's efforts to turn the PPP into a party completely supportive of the military regime became apparent in 1982 when he succeeded in removing government critics from the PPP electoral list in preparation for the 1982 general elections. His campaign was mainly directed against some leaders of the Nahdlatul Ulama, the ulama's party which has wide support particularly in East Java, and some of whose members have been vocal in their criticism of government policy. As a result of these machinations, Tempo reports, 76 of the 96 PPP members now in Parliament are Naro's men. People loyal to him also occupy 24 out of the 37 seats on the party's Central Board.

Congress delegates handpicked Many delegates to the Congress who had been appointed by their regional branches were refused entry to the hotel where the meeting was held. Tempo reports that more than a hundred NU delegates were kept out, and went to NU headquarters in Jakarta to complain. Sinar Harapan reported that people who were known to be unwilling to follow the Naro line were only invited to attend the opening and closing formal sessions and

In session. The PPP Congress told to ''fortify the Pancasila".

refused entry to sessions where de,cisions were taken. One PPP Central Board leader told Tempo quite bluntly that it was up to the Central Board to select delegates to represent the regions. The hotel used as the venue of the Congress is the location of one of the most notorious night clubs in Jakarta, a choice deeply offensive to orthodox Muslims.

Hav41g packed the Congress with his followers, Naro then treated them with contempt. At the first working session, he simply presented a short summary of his report, copies of which were not distributed until the next day. As soon as he had finished speaking, his report was accepted by acclamation on a proposal from the platform, and it was then decided that no further discussion was needed . When "election" time came, Naro was proposed and "elected" unopposed, and appointed as the sole formateur with powers to appoint all the members of the Central Board.

Far-reaching consequences The elimination of the PPP as a Muslim party could have far­reaching political repercussions. Until the Naro coup, the PPP could never, it is true, hope to win a majority in parliament or play an effective role in national or local government because electoral processes and legislative bodies are rigged in the government's favour; but it was nevertheless a vehicle for Muslim views and enjoyed support from a considerable section of Muslims. During past general election campaigns, the PPP has always been able to organise well-attended rallies; at the 1982 elections, these rallies were the occasion for pronounced condemnation of the army's party, GOLKAR, and of government policy. Naro's takeover has put an end to any illusions among Muslims of its relevance and its value as a political vehicle. One respected NU leader, Abdulrahman Wahid, h.as warned that "if there is no longer an outlet for Muslim aspirations, Muslim groups could go underground". (Tempo, 25 August)

The well-known singer, Rhoma Irama, whose pop group performed extensively at PPP election rallies during the 1982 elections, has publicly withdrawn his support for the party. "They have no claim any more to represent Muslim aspirations," he said. He foresaw that Muslims would become apathetic about political activity, and "could turn to unconstitutional means. And if that happens, it won't be the fault of the Muslims. The regulation of political life in this country has closed the door for Muslims to engage in constitutional activity." (Tempo, 25 August)

4 T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

West Papuan refugees

Forced repatriation lllust be prevented The fate of thousands of West Papuan refugees now staying in many locations all along the PNG side of the border with Indonesia still hangs in the balance . While the Papua New Guinea government appears to be doing everything possible to delay repatriation, the Indonesian authorities are ma~ing all preparations for repatriation to proceed before the end of September. The following is a summary, for the record, of developments since the beginning of August:

* In early August, PNG government spokesmen were reported in the PNG press as saying that "the repatriation of 9,000 border-crossers" would commence "in a few weeks". This led to condemnation in the PNG press, protests from students and other groups and a statement by the PNG Red Cross (Post Courier, 6 August) insisting that the UNHCR, the Red Cross and other agencies must be involved "in the solution of the complex and difficult issue". Ten days later, a group of lawyers in PNG, in a closely argued statement, declared categorically that the repatriation which appeared to be being planned by PNG and Indonesia would be in violation both of PNG's own Constittttion and of international law (PNG Times, 16 August) . * A week later, the Deputy Governor of Indonesia's province of Irian Jaya, Brigadier-General Sugiyono announced (Sinar Harapan, 25 August) that agreement had been reached in negotiations between teams from the two sides in Port Moresby that repatriation of the refugees would commence on 17 September. He said that Indonesian officials would go to the camps where the refugees are now situated to "hold dialogue" with the people and compile their personal data. * Meanwhile, in a move that clearly contradicted any such agreement, the PNG government reversed its position regarding involvement of the UN High Commission for Refugees which until then had only been allowed access to Vanimo camp which accommodates refugees who are recognised by all sides as not being eligible for any kind of repatration. The UNHCR was now being given access to all refugees camps. This reversal was almost certainly prompted by the news that 51 refugees had died at Komopkin up to mid-August; the figure soon rose to 97 (see box). Whether access would be confined to welfare work only or would also involve allowing the UNHCR to undertake protection activities has not, to TAPOL's knowledge, been officially clarified, though from UNHCR circles, T APOL understands that access must, as far as the agency is concerned, involve all aspects of its work. * Then in an article in the Guardian (7 September), Sydney­based journalist Robin Osborne wrote that the thousands of refugees had been told that they must start returning home on 17 September. He wrote:

Requests that Indonesia permit outside monitoring have been turned down. Port Moresby has said that its own army will help in the operation, but many refugees have vowed they will not co-operate.

Osborne hinted strongly however that the Michael Somare government was divided on the issue for he wrote that if, when faced with compulsory repatriation, "refugees decided to run for the hills, most of Mr Michael Somare's ministers could do likewise, leaving the man Indonesia calls its 'good and sensible friend' isolated". * From organisations in the UK and Denmark, including Survival International, the Anti-Slavery Society, the chairman of the Parliamentary Human Rights Group and T APOL in London and the International Working Group on Indigenous Affairs in Cop.enhagen, cables were sent urging the Somare government not to proceed with any forced repatriation and to allow the UNHCR to determine their status as refugees. * Since then, the PNG government, aware of the strength of

domestic and international concern, appears to be moving towards a position of avoiding any enforced repatriation. The government has apparently not denied that agreement was reached with Indonesia on repatriation though it has denied that a date was set (Sydney Morning Herald, 11 September). It would seem to be relying on delaying tactics, insisting that firm guarantees must first be forthcoming from Indonesia before any repatriation can go ahead. The problem with such guarantees is that whether or not the PNG government regards them as reliable, the refugees themselves are hardly likely to accept any guarantees from the very authorities which have been harassing them for years.

ICJ mission visits border * A six-man mission of the Australian International Commission of Jurists meanwhile visited all border camps in the first week of September. It was led by John Dowd, shadow Attorney-General, and included Father Bert Vandeberg of the Netherlands Institute of Human Rights who has spent 30 years in West Papua. The mission's full report will not be available in time for coverage in this issue, but an AAP/Reuters report from Port Moresby (Sydney Morning Herald, 11 September) quotes the mission as reaching the conclusion that "the refugees were

--Refugees die of starvation--

A total of 96 West Papuan refugees died of starvation in the southern border province of Papua New Guinea up to the end of August (West Australian, 30 August). The deaths have occurred mainly in Komopkin, a remote area not far from the border with Indonesia, as well as at nearby refugee camps in Bankin and Kungim.

The influx of refugees has been so great that, although local villagers gave all the help they could, it was far from adequate . Government supplies dropped twice in the early period quickly dried up and were not replenished. Komopkin normally supports a population of 150 but now has to cope with more than 2000 people .

Australian Associated Press journalist Chris Pash reported (The Age, 24 August) that many of the refugees were in a state of severe malnutrition already when they arrived. Some had trekked from up to 50 kilometres inside the border; 18 had died during the month after the first refugees arrived in April.

The scandal of the high death rate first became public in Papua New Guinea when Member of Parliament Warren Dutton told the press that his first reports about the danger of death from starvation had not been heeded.

A sizeable influx of relief funds from international agencies and from the UNHCR since August has helped improve food and medical supplies in the stricken areas. In an attempt to cope more effectively with the refugees' welfare, the PNG government decided earlier this year to transfer the issue from the hands of the Border Liaison Committee of the Foreign Affairs Department to the Department of Provincial Affairs.

almost unanimous in that they would not agree to be voluntarily repatriated". A member of the mission, David Bitel said however that "September 17 is firmly fixed in their minds and they think they have to go".

Special locations being built, say Indonesians * Meanwhile, reports in the Indonesian press persist in creating the impression that repatriation of all the refugees

T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 5

West Papuan refugees

(excluding those in Vanimo) will commence imminently. Special locations have been set up in ten places along the border, according to Tempo (8 September) ; each one consists of complexes with dozens of barracks to accommodate the returning refugees. This strengthens the impression that the Indonesian military authorities intend to locate all refugees who are returned in encampments that would make it easy for the troops to maintain tight control over their future movements . This follows the style of population control already implemented in East Timar. The officer responsible for the operation in West Papua, the provincial Deputy-Governor, Brigadier-General Sugiono has seen service as a para-commando officer during the war in that country . * With regard to repatriation plans, the Indonesians have recognised since early September that the 17 September deadline will not be kept, and are now claiming that repatriation will commence before the end of September. Their explanation for the postponement is that , in view of demands from PNG for a written guarantee regarding the refugees' safety, Foreign Minister Mochtar has now agreed to provide written safeguards . The delay over the question of the guarantee, according to Jakarta, meant that a second round of negotiations between teams of the two sides that were to have taken place on 1 September had to be postponed. However the issue appears to be far from being solved in Indonesia's favour because, according to Michael Richardson, writing in the Sydney Morning Herald (11 September), the PNG government is now seeking additional arrangements to "include the right of special access to Irian Jaya by the UNHCR or officials from PNG's embassy in Jakarta".

Although the signs at the moment are that repatriation from PNG is unlikely, it is also clear that pressure has helped to bring this about. The signs from Jakarta are that the Indonesian military have no intention of letting the matter rest there . Under such circumstances, PNG will need all the support it can get to withstand further pressure from Indonesia and to cope with the consequence if it succeeds in withstanding Indonesian pressure.

Over half the border people have left for PNG A group of representatives from church agencies in Papua New Guinea and Australia who visited the three main refugee centres in the West Sepik Province of PNG at the end of July believe that the 9 ,000 or more bush people who have crossed over into PNG in the last six months (excluding the one thousand or so being accommodated in Vanimo) account for about half the Melanesians living near the Indonesian side of the border.

The group consisted of representatives from the Melanesian Council of Churches, World Christian Action (the aid body of the Australian Council of Churches), the PNG Catholic Commission for Justice , Development and Peace , Australian Catholic Relief and the Jesuit Refugee Service based in Melbourne.

Their report dealt at length with relief needs in the camps, and also included a summary of what they learnt from interviews with the refugees:

* This is not a sudden or isolated crisis; people have been experiencing harassment for some years .

* They crossed the border not only out of fear, but many are aware that their movement is a statement, to tell the people of PNG and other countries of their plight. The OPM people among the refugees interpret the movement as a desire for independence.

* Though there are disturbances in other parts of Irian Jaya, it is difficult to imagine that people will come across the border

from inland villages more than a few days' walk from the border.

* They were told many instances of harassment by the Indonesian authorities, all of which sounded credible . Some refugees had not had personal experience of harassment but related stories from others .

* Though the transmigration programme is feared by many border people , only those from villages near the coast have had direct experience of it.

* At the camps in Green River and Kamberatoro, there appear to be more men ; but they have mostly come in family units, so there are also a large number of children . None of the refugees appears to be older than 50 years. The really old people have chosen not to come, preferring to build isolated huts and stay behind on their land. Refugees were concerned that many of these old people may already be dead .

500 more cross over Another 500 West Papuan refugees crossed over into PNG in mid-September , according to government officials in Port Moresby. They are now in Kugo village, west of the Ok Tedi mining township of Tabubil , in the central mountainous region of the border. PNG government officials say they do not know the reasons for this latest influx. (Post Courier , 14 September 1984.)

SECOND EDITION OUT NOW!

TAPOL's book on West Papua was sold out within a year of publication. With demand for the book still strong, a second edition has been published, expanded to include an extra chapter giving an account of developments in West Papua since the beginning of this year.

Order your copy now!

Price: £3.00 plus postage (50 pence for the UK or seamail; £2.00 for airmail.)

6 TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

''We fear for our lives'' The following is a personalised account of the circumstances of some of the West Papuan refugees who were interviewed by members of church relief and refugee agencies who visited refugee camps in West Sepik province of Papua New Guinea from 27 July to 1 August.

Jacob is in his late thirties, married, with four children. He comes from Jayapura District but 100 km inland in the lower highlands area. In better times, he would be happily exercising the role of village councillor, the office he holds. Responsi­bility for leadership has led him to a grave decision, however: to lead his people away from their traditional land across the bor­der. The journey to the relative safety of PNG soil took just on a week. It had to be done secretly, the people scavenging for food along the way. The most immediate task was to avoid being discovered by the Indonesian soldiers searching for them. Platoons of RPKD commandos are also in the area right along the border - these are the "red beret" specialists. The jungle is in­credibly dense and sufficient to assist such secret movements, however, and so they were not discovered.

Why would someone like Jacob put himself and his people into such danger, and why would any Melanesian leave his land, his "pies bilong tumbuna"? Jacob says there are two basic reasons. Firstly, they are scared for their welfare at home because of the increased Indonesian milit­ary presence. Secondly, they feel power­less to protect their cultural identity and traditional way of life against the Indone­sian "colonisation", a process which has been brutal and humiliating. Jacob says that they want the world to know what the situation is. -· ' For Jacob's people, the hard times began in 1977 when military personnel started to move into the area. The tragedy which marked itself into their history at that time was the arbitrary killi~ of one of the teachers. At this time, many of the people fled the village in fear to hide in the bush for weeks. Whey they eventually re­turned, they were continually harassed by the soldiers and this has continued up till now.

The harassment has taken the form of soldiers raiding the gardens, standing over the people for goods, ridiculing their cul­ture, treating them as lesser beings. The bush telegraph continually brings in stories of atrocities committed against the Melanesian people in other parts of Irian Jaya: stories of brutal murders, mutilation, rape, church desecration, house burnings, disappearance of people, shootings of teenagers who dared to draw a Free West Papua Flag in the sand; news of the trans­migration policy of the Indonesian govern­ment in which some 900,000, mainly Mus­lim Javanese, are to be moved into Irian Jaya in the next six years. No wonder the simple villagers lived in a state of fear for themselves and their heritage.

Even so, Jacob and his people could consider no alternative to coming to terms with the Indonesian presence in their area. They could not consider themselves "In-

donesian" but maybe some form of accom­modation was possible. So they went about their. daily lives, held down service jobs and tried to live peacefully even within the gen­eral atmosphere of oppression. They .re­ceived from time to time visits from OPM officials urging them to some form of resis­tance, but the urgings were ignored . (The OPM is the name given to the movement, both military and political, struggling for the complete independence of Irian Jaya .)

February 1984 changed the whole scene for them. The OPM tried to attack Jayap­ura, relying on large-scale defections of West Irianese from the armed services. It never really got off the ground but a more open conflict had started, the worst since 1978. Many educated West Irianese fled the capital and escaped into PNG which is only a matter of hours away by canoe. House-to-house searches began, every temporary absence being questioned. Dis­appearances of. people became common. Leaders such as Arnold Ap, were arrested and in the worst cases executed. News of this spread quickly throughout the pro­vince. The military became tense and har­der to conciliate at local level.

Then came the Yurup incident in which the OPM attacked a plane after it had landed and captured all those on board . They shot the two Indonesian passengers and kidnapped the Swiss mission pilot. This was not a planned event but soon some of the shrewder heads of the OPM were talking terms of release: K 1.5 million ransom, and that the "Irian Jaya issue" shourd be raised at the United Nations. In the end, the pilot's release was successfully negotiated but the people of the area now lived in heightened fear, for the fighting had come home to them.

Retaliation was quick in coming with in­creased patrols, small-scale fighting bet­ween OPM and the Indonesian soldiers, continuous questioning. And so, the momentous decision to leave: to leave their homes, their livelihoods, their land; to leave the old eo1:>le who chose to re-

TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

main, some in their homes, some in the bush gardens.

Jacob is a man of considerable dignity. He is grateful for the respite now being provided for him and his people but the question of "what next?" hangs over the camp like the grey clouds present daily. Their present safety and well-being de­pends on the bonds of Melanesian brother­hood which the people of PNG have ex­pressed. They want to return home when it is safe, but "safety" is a relative term in the Irian Jayan context. Ultimately, the people want merdeka - freedom in their own land, and then they will truly be safe. Will they accept some verbal assurance from the Indonesian government that they will not suffer if they . return? Regrettably, the answer is "No" and hence the waiting and the praying.

Now that the PNG government has ag­reed to "escort" illegal border crossers like Jacob back into Irian Jaya, all their fears have returned. Did they do the right thing in coming? Will they suffer on their return, not immediately, but as time goes by? What does the long term future hold for them and their children?

The same story is told by David, a Un­ited Church pastor, although he and his family had been in the bush for three and a half years in hiding before crossing the bor­der. They fled after witnessing atrocities at home. In fact, many of the people who have crossed have been wandering for years, fearful of returning to their homes.

Otto is a university graduate in his mid­twenties. He was an active member of one of the pro-Melanesian cells in Jayapura. He witnessed the "disappearance" of col­leagues and fled when it was clear that the Indonesian security was checking on him. Paul, a simple fisherman, assisted them to escape and so he and his family are now in PNG afraid to return home. For David and Otto, the future seems to be political asylum in PNG or elsewhere. They are all waiting ...

7

West Papuan refugees

Bishop of V animo talks about the refugees

Bishop John Etheridge, Bishop of Vanimo, (West Sepik Province of Papua New Guinea) , gave this interview on 31July1984 during a visit to Vanimo by the representative of the Jesuit Refugee Service, Australia:

People have been crossing the border between PNG and Irian Jaya Indonesia before. How does the movement of people in recent months compare with the border crossings in previous years?

This is the greatest number that I have experienced since I've been here . It i~ estimated that there are now about 10,000 West Irian people here in Papua New Guinea . A number of years ago, about 1977-'78, we had about 3,000 people who came across the border but this would the greatest amount we've had.

Are they the same sort of people as came that time? Those 900 or so in the Kamberatoro area have left many

villages within two main areas. In Green River where we have about 500 people, they have come from 3 or 5 villages, I understand. So in all the people come from quite a number of villages.

What state are the refugees in when they arrive? What is their physical and psychological condition? What care do they need?

One can say they fled, they are concerned, though they are not terrified. They are poor, often sick, and very malourished. There is not a great difference in physical condition between the border refugees and our own border people , except that amongst the refugees there is more sickness. Some have ulcers that they have had for 6 or 8 months which you won't find here because our people have medical treatment available. But most of those people have not had medical treatment for a long time. They are malnourished, but in that not markedly different from our own people.

You will notice a difference in the people in the Vanimo camp. They are physically better than the bush refugees. But that is generally true for coastal people.

What previous contact have the refugees had with the Church? Most of the people who have come across are Christians and

the majority are Catholics . All have had contact with the churches. Their spirituality is ·very much the same as the Papua New Guinea people at the border.

The Catholics are at home in our church, though we don't know their language. The Protestants in Black Water have 2 or 3 pastors of their church among them. They have their own service on Sunday. It is well organised. I send a priest out for the Catoholics every Sunday. The last time when 700 people came there was not a single Catholic (nor were they all) Christians. Then a group came through to the Bewani area last year who were mainly Catholics.

Do the refugees manage their own community life? The people are well disciplined and organised among

themselves, there are leaders chosen and jobs assigned. They are not just here and being fed . At Kamberatoro they do work for the local community. Education-wise they are at a higher level than our local border people.

What help is being provided for them? Here in the Vanimo camp they are taken to a quarantine

camp for 3 weeks and given medical treatment and so on. After that they are taken to the Black Water camp where they are establishing themselves with bush houses and tents, and they are looked after with food. The United Nations finances the feeding and other attention in the Black Water camp.

In the bush area at Kamberatoro where there are 8~900 refugees the mission is looking after them completely with food, clothing, shelter and so on. For medical care I have two nurses

working there with the refugees full-time. The group at Green River, where there are 500 or so are not

as well off as those at Vanimo or Kamberatoro . They were being fed, this was started through Foreign Affairs, but now it looks like the mission will be taking this up and making sure they are fed.

I know very little about what is going on down in the Western Province . It seems hard to get information, but I would think the Secretary of the Bishops' development committee can get that. I am assured they are being looked after to some degree.

How have the people received these refugees? Very, very well. Many, both in the Black Water camp and out

in the bush are related to some degree. The people have accepted them very well. They would like to be involved more. They would like to be able to go out and see them, take food out to them.

I gather you've been able to speak with quite a few of them. What are the main reasons they give for coming?

The reason they give is that they are afraid of the Indonesian soldiers. They are afraid of being harassed in their villages. There have been a number of skirmishes and incidents between the OPM (Organisasi Papua Merdeka "Free Papua Movement") and the Indonesian soldiers in the area of the border. And these people tell me they are running away because of the reprisals against them for what the OPM has and is doing against the Indonesian government there. But I also believe that the OPM themselves have told the people to move out. So I think that is another reason as well as their running away from the harassment of the Indonesian soldiers.

I believe they are running away in fear. They are afraid to stay in their villages while the Indonesian soldiers are in the area. There may be reprisals against them.

Is this a recent thing? Has there been some particular build-up to occasion this larger scale movement?

This has been going for quite a while. The Indonesian army patrols there in the area of the border. But this has built up since the OPM tried to take over Jayapura town and other areas. They made an attack on the government over there in a number of towns and districts. Then there was the incident of the kidnapping of the Swiss pilot when two Indonesians were killed. These incidents brought things to a head. That is when the people started to come across. Before that February incident in Jayapura town there were no refugees.

Can you briefly describe what the refugees have told you of the February incident?

I have heard there were attacks by the OPM on the army garrison, that they intended to knock out the power generator and take over the airstrip. I don't think this happened though they did manage to raise their West Papuan flag in Jayapura. But it seems the affair did not really come off as they intended.

And what was the Swiss pilot incident? . He flew a mission plane (for the Jayapura Catholic Mission)

with some cargo, and an Irianese teacher, into a place called Yurup. There is now no priest at that place but the teacher was intended to remain and be a church leader there. He also had an Indonesian doctor and a businessman with him. When they arrived I understand they were surrounded by the OPM and taken prisoner: the teacher, the Swiss pilot and the 2 Indonesians. Then the OPM shot the 2 Indonesians. Shot them

8 TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

with guns. They were walking away along the road in the bush. This is what I was told by the pilot. The pilot was in front, then the teacher and the 2 Indonesians at the back. As they were walking he heard 2 guns fire, he looked around and saw they had just shot the 2 Indonesians.

What did they hope to achieve by this? Did they explain this to the pilot?

It was hard to know exactly. At one stage they asked quite a large ransom: $1.5 million for the return of the Swiss pilot. But it seemed to me they were after recognition . They wanted to be recognised internationally as a cause , as a force, for what they were doing and they felt this was one way of getting that recognition. I'm pretty sure of that because one of the demands they made for his release was that the Swiss government would bring it up at the United Nations . Then they were told the Swiss government is not a member of the United Nations.

Do you feel there is a danger to Papua New Guinea in this build­up of troops at the border?

There is a possibility that there could be a danger.

Have you heard what numbers of troops there are? I've heard a couple of thousand, but I hear so many different

things that I don't really know. I do know there has been &n increase of troops there.

One of the accounts of the disquiet of the Melanesian people in lrian Jaya that we have heard is that their land is being taken by transmigrants who came from other parts of Indonesia, especially from Java. How much do the people you have spoken to claim that the transmigration is affecting them? Do they mention a

shifting of population onto their land? Very little actually. It has not yet affected these people

because I don't believe the transmigration has got this far. They know about it of course and they are concerned about it. People in Papua New Guinea near the border 'are also concerned because there is land on the other side of the border which traditionally belongs to people on this side. For a Melanesian, land is life. So there are people in Papua New Guinea who are really concerned about the transmigration .

There is another argument that it is an Indonesian policy to scare people, move them from the land, and then move in and resettle a group of Javanese people so that there is a cordon of non­Melanesians living along the border, thus protecting it. Do you think this is possibly so?

It is a possibility. It is one way they could get rid of the OPM-by sealing the border.

Since your help and concern has become known, what support have you received from around Papua New Guinea?

I have received tremendous support financially, money to help the refugees; materially as with clothing people have sent; but moral support too that I received verbally and by letters, such as: "Thank the Lord you are doing something" . This is from the People of Papua New Guinea. But I have als" received support from Australia and other countries.

Is there anything else you could ask of people here in Papua New Guinea, or elsewhere? Besides this support and patience?

I'd have to think about that. Continued on page 20

OPM report on atrocities in Merauke A report just received by T APOL from the Merauke District Command of the Free Papua Movement (OPM) describes at­rocities committed by Indonesian para­commandos in the Merauke sub-districts of Mindiptana and Waropka in May and June this year. As reported in the last issue of TAPOL Bulletin (No 64, July 1984), the Indonesian authorities have themselves ad­mitted that well over half the population in the two sub-districts have fled, leaving their villages deserted. 5,032 people out of a population of 8,506 have left Mindiptana villages, and 4,358 have fled from villages in Waropka. (Sinar Harapan, 19 July, 1984.)

According to the OPM report, dated 23 June, the OPM launched attacks on In­donesian military posts at Sau village, Kauh-Digul sub-district on 3 May resulting in two casualties on the Indonesian side, and in Mindiptana resulting in two OPM guerrilla dead and one seriously wounded, with no losses for the Indonesians. A third attack followed in Waropka on 13 June. The atrocities which followed these inci­dents are described by OPM as follows:

* "Troops entered villages, destroyed homes in all the kampungs, and de­stroyed the people's gardens, also kil­ling livestock. Houses of the Catholic missions at Waropka and Ninati were sacked. Churches were attacked and fired at, inflicting heavy damage; all the church paraphernalia was thrown out and burnt, including bibles and rosaries." OPM claims that the Indone­sian authorities then spread reports that these atrocities had been committed by

the OPM.

* When the inhabitants of the region of Muju fled their villages, about a hundred people were captured by In­donesian troops. The captured people were locked in a rice storage shed, and kept inside for days without food or ac­cess to sanitation. Many of the women inside including Catholic nuns were raped. At the time of writing the report, the OPM did not know anything about the fate of these people.

* In June, 15 men were arrested by 12 In­donesian soldiers in Kali Merauke reg­ion and ordered to lead the troops to OPM hide-outs and to groups of villa­gers making their way across the border to Papua New Guinea. The captured men and soldiers went in the direction of Bosset, near the border but found no one, so when they reached the bank of the Fly River on the border, fourteen of the fifteen men were shot dead, and the

fifteenth man was orderd to behead the corpses. The heads were then carried away and buried elsewhere.

The OPM report also claims that many villagers in the sub-districts of Tanah Merah, Kouh, Oksibil, Kiwirok and Ak­misibil have been forced to flee across the border as a result of the escalation in OPM activities throughout the northern region of Merauke District. Many are believed to have crossed the border near Ok Tedi cop­per-mine though others are thought to be roaming in the forests and mountains in West Papua.

Although Catholic missions in the reg­ion have, according to the OPM report, suffered severely at the hands of the milit­ary, the church has refrained from making anything public to avoid creating further problems for missionaries working in the region . Mission stations in Muju sub-dis­trict are now empty of priests, brothers and

Taken at an OPM base in Merauke, earlier this year.

TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 9

Arniy plans to re-locate the population of West Papua

I

t ~. :i:.:m1.1t n:.=u:ncAJ1;.;Jf • I ,lml. .. -• 6 lllOllth•

I -l'..aaa Per•iapu • Preparatory period

Pare21c:anaan du

;iersiapu peralatazr.

Planning and prepara­tion or equipment

' bulaia 6 monthe

- Pene~tua.r:1 Lo~aai

Selection of locations

?erenc&llaan Aktivitas

I Planning of activity

Pengorganisasian. Organisation

6 b'lllu - l ~~=-6 months - 1 year

- Penyi apan la.ban

pertanian.

,

Preparing agricultural land

~- ::~:~h~:h~:~A ST?.UK

Taking care of infra­structure and land

3 - 6 months - - ·1~ Penelitian

Linguistrik du

pola tingkah laku. Investigation of lan­guages and behaviour patterns

- }'; elakukan komWlika&i

dan kerja same.~

Carrying out communi­and co-opera-

~ . 6 bulaz • l tahUD

6 months - 1 year

- H ~bi.l:lbing dan

penyuluhan ber­

mukim. Guiding and instructing the re-settlers

- M ecbicibi.Dg dan pe~yu-

/ luha.n perta!lian. '

iving guidance and in­truction about agricul­

ture

i

' 2 ta.h1Ul - 5 2 - 5 yeora

tah:m

- Biobinc;an dan pe -

•

nyuiunan Del'aeya­

rakat. Guidance and i nstructi on on living as communities

- Bi mbingan dan penyulu­

~~ beroukim sehat. uida~ce and i nstruction on eal thy living

Bimbin~an dan penyulu h3D pendiciikan anak­a:iak • ••. and on educating chil

- Bimbir:gan d3.Il Eenyulu-/~ ke-Aga.maan. \

~Religious guidance and in-. struction

~•-•t_in_s __ _ /,

~ I /;'

FASE P!:RSIAPAM ~

Preparatory pha•e

~nyelesai&D tanah. Completing land questions

~enyiapaD Petug~.

Preparing officials

FASE PUIENCANAAff

Plannina phaH

-· Pembangunan Sarana/P-li ~~~~~~~~~' Pras~rana pokok. Building basic infra­structure Pea:bangunan

tihEn.

Building training facilities

T.ASE

PEMBAt1Gt''!~! SARANA

Preparin1 faeilities phase

~ ~

Inviting the population

ear a

kerja.

Acquainting them with the methods of work

FASE MENGAJAX

'>

Phase of getting the population to take part

\

- l~ e1"bii:1bing dan penyuj

ltlhan keterampila.r:1

lain. Guidance and nstr.uctis:m in other skill: - Pexrverahan lanan diin

alat-alat kerja dengan tetap d.ibimbing dan diavasi.

Handing over land and working implements under continued guidance and supervision

~ FASE Mi:UDlDfi ~

Educational phase

, .

I~ fl : . I \- Dimbi.ne;an dan pe:iyuluf

\ \ .. :::-. ::.1-:~.-:.:.,. Md Ii \ nstruct1on \ • - Bia:bingan d&D penyu:

luhan pertukangan dan

\

keterampil.im. · ••• and on crafts and skill~

. - Bimbinc-an dan Tlen-;ulu~ han lain-lain.

Other kinds of guidance and instruction

~ FASE

Mj:';l-'J!Il\A * Guidance phase

*Diagram translated by TAPOL A plan for the re-settlement of the West Papuan population to locations that "can easily be guided and controlled so that the GPK (ie, the OPM) can be separated from the people" is set out in detail in a document issued in April 1984 by Brigadier-General Meliala Sembiring, Military Commander of the province of lrian Jaya. The document entitled "Basic Pattern of Territorial Management Specific to Irian Jaya by Means of Community Growth Centres" recently came into T APO L's hands. The above "Diagram of the Plan" is appended to the document. A comprehensive account of this document will be published in the forthcoming TAPOL Bulletin.

New evidence about the murder of Arnold Ap Peter Hastings, the foreign editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, is now firmly convinced that Arnold Ap , the Jayapura Museum curator who was arrested last November, was killed by Kopassandha troops after they had deliberately plotted his "escape" from a prison in Jayapura. He bases his conviction on a letter recently sent to him by expatriates now worldng in West Papua .

The letter confirms that Ap did make an escape attempt some time earlier in his detention and was re-captured. But the second "escape" was, writes Hastings,

a put-up job by the . Kopassandha or red-berets, the paratroop formation, some of whose troops are in Irian Jaya . Some Kopassandha officers thought up a neat scheme whereby an alcoholic Irianese prison guard was offered a relatively huge sum to arrange for Ap's escape. From the moment it occurred, his every move down to the time he was cornered and killed, was carefully monitored. (Sydney Morning Herald, 27 August 1984.)

Hastings prefaces his account by pointing out that the letter he received was signed by five foreigners, two of whom he knew personally. The letter also expressed support for Australian academics who have signed various protests againsHhe murder of Arnold A .

Murdani bans Hastings Shortly after the appearance of this report , the Sydney Morning Herald announced that Peter Hastings has been banned indefinitely from entering Indonesia because of his reports on Ap's killing. The ban was issued on the personal instructions of General Murdani, Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief, after the first of Hastings' reports on the death of Arnold appeared in May 1984 (see TAPOL Bulletin No 63, May 1984). On 8 July, Hastings wrote a second report which gave the version of Indonesian Foreign Minister, Mochtar Kusumaatmaja, claiming that Ap was killed in a shoot-out with Indonesian troops, as well as the version of Mulya Lubis , Director of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute who was told in Jayapura that Ap had made a desperate bid to flee but had been shot down by troops four days later. The third Hastings ' account now confirms not only that he was shot down in cold blood but that the "escape" was a premeditated trick by Kopassandha officers. For Hastings to have put his name to such an account will not endear him to men like Murdani, and it could keep out a journalist whom the military regime have long regarded as one of their few friends among Australian journalists

Arnold Ap (right) with a member of his Mambesak group. "Maybe you think what I am doing is stupid. But it is what I think I should do for my people before I die." (October 1982.) Taken from Zelfbeschikking, April-May-June, 1984.

TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 11

East Timar

UN again postpones discussion on East Timor The UN General Assembly's General (Agenda) Committee de­cided on 20 September to postpone further discussion of East Timor until the 40th General Assembly meeting in 1985 . The proposal , submitted by Iceland, gave two reasons : the continu­ing uncertainty about actual conditions inside East Timor , and the consultations still taking place under the terms of the 1982 General Assembly resolution which instructed the UN Secretary General to conduct discussions with all parties directly con­cerned. In the past few months , the UN has produced two documents rega'tding East Timor, both of which have been strongly criticised.

The UN General Secretary's Progress Report (A/39/361, 25 July 1984) gives an account of his contacts with representatives of the Indonesian and Portuguese governments in pursuance of UN General Assembly Resolution 37/30 adopted on 23 November 1982, instructing the Secretary-General "to initiate consultations with all parties directly concerned with a view to exploring avenues for achieving a comprehensive settlement of the problem" .

UN consultations should include East Timor people. In a letter to UN Secretary-General Mr Perez de Cuellar, on 10 August, Lord A vebury, chairman of the Parliamentary Human Rights Group wrote:

As it. stands, the report is essentially a log of contacts with representatives of the Indonesian government and the Portuguese government ... What I did not find in the report, however, was any

THE W. dR . • .•• • i·. ••• .

dGdlftST ,EdST TllTIOR

. ..·.•.;.•• ·, ....

mention of consultations with the East Timorese themselves. There is no indication, for example, that any attempt was J!lade to CO?sult with the Revolutionary Front for the Independence of East T1mor (FRETILIN) or any other Timorese parties . . .

Would not the people of East Timor be considered as one of the "parties directly concerned?" And is a comprehensive settlement of the problem possible without the direct involvement of those most affected by any settlement, namely, the East Timorese? I submit that any negotiations that do not include representatives of the Timorese people will fail to produce a lasting solution to the East Timorese problem.

Frankly, I do not think you will succeed unless you follow the dictates of common sense and Resolution 37/30, and include the East Timorese themselves on your agenda of consultations ...

Bias in UN Working Paper attacked The other UN document prepared for this year's General Assembly is a Working Paper written by the Secretariat (A/ AC.109/783, 3 August 1984) for the Decolonisation Committee. This Working Paper was criticised by Roger Clark, Professor of Law at Rutgers School of Law, in a Petition made on behalf of the New York-based International League for Human Rights. He commends past documents from the UN Secretariat on East Timor, but expresses disappointment and concern with the tone and the selection of material for the present Report. "Too often, in our view, the Report gives undue emphasis to uncritically­presented Indonesian propaganda handouts." The Petition points out that "while Indonesian 'statistics' are reproduced extensively and uncritically, the Report downplays information coming from other sources". The Report refers casually to the

JUST OUT! The War Against East Timor analyses Indonesia's military and political strategy to subjugate and integrate East Timor since General Suharto's invasion of this former Portuguese colony in 1975. The authors, Carmel Budiardjo and Liem Soei Liong, present for the first time a comprehensive account of the current resurgence of Fretilin, which is the national libera­tion movement of the people of East Tim or, following its earlier defeat in 1977-78.

. Nine secret Indonesian Army documents, captured by Fretilin guer­rillas in December 1982, are here published in translation. They constitute an extraordinary manual of counter-insurgency operations, as well as demonstrating how real is Fretilin's renewed challenge to Indonesian annexation.

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12 TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

letter of 16 February 1984 from the Apostolic Administrator of Dili , Mgr Belo* whilst saying nothing of its contents.

It is instructive to compare the way in which the Belo letter is glossed over in the Secretariat document with the prominent place given to it in a letter of 6 July 1984 from 123 members of the US House of Representatives to the US Secretary of State . That letter which represents a telling indictment of the current situation in the territory and urges the US government to insist that it be alleviated , gives strong emphasis to the views of what the Congressmen refer to as a "well-regarded clergyman" . What a different tone the Secretariat Report might have had if it had emphasised the words of the man of God rather than those of the governmental propaganda machine!

More criticism of the Secretariat Working Paper was made in a statement to the Decolonisation Committee by Jose Ramos Horta, representing Fretilin . The following are excerpts from the Fretilin statement:

In paragraph 11, the authors of "Working paper" went even further in what I would now call politically motivated bias . When they refer to the East Timorese freedom fighters, they called us "anti-Government guerrillas"! Not using quotation marks to clarify that such an expression was used by the Indonesian

*Reproduced in full in TAPOL Bulletin No 63, March 1984.

military, the authors of the "Working paper" seem to suggest that those resisting in East Timar are fighting against a legal government of that territory.

Chapters V and VI deal with the "Food situation" and "Economic, Social and Educational Conditions" in East Timar. Anyone who reads these two chapters would be either impressed with the great things Indonesia has done in East Timar or would dismiss these claims as pure propaganda. What we cannot understand is how the authors of the so-called "Working paper" can be so daring in their pro-Indonesian bias to the point of reproducing in two full pages pure Indonesian propaganda. Indonesia , the aggressor responsible for the killing, famine and wanton destruction in East Timar, is presented as a generous benefactor of the East Timorese people. The authors of the "Working paper" used only two sources for the two chapters, V and VI : the Australian parliamentary delegation which visited East Timar in July of 1983 for no more than four days; and Indonesian government reports. The Australian parliamentary delegation was led by a certain Mr Morrison who is well-known for his pro-Indonesia and anti-East Timar views. Mr Morrison's report was completely discredited in Australia . The authors of the Secretariat chose to ignore other available information from more reliable sources that offer a different picture of the situation in East Timar. Continued on page 14

Timorese will fight to the end, says former Bishop The following excerpts are taken from an interview of Mgr da Costa Lopes, former papal administrator or acting bishop of East Timar, by Ken Pottinger, in Newsweek, 3 September 1984. In an introduction, Pottinger describes Mgr da Costa Lopes as an "outstanding advocate of independence" for East Timar who was "recalled by the Vatican last year under pressure from Indonesia 's conservative Roman Catholic bishops".

Do you think that Washington has a role to play in resolving the East Timor problem? Is it possible that the United States could put effective pressure on Indonesia?

We have to distinguish between the views of the American people and those of the government. I believe that the people of the United States are sympathetic to the case of East Timar but the American government is compromised with Indonesia. As you know, [the then US secretary of state] Henry Kissinger was in Jakarta the day before Indonesia invaded, and made it clear that the United States was not opposed to the move. Washington has since provided much of the military equipment used by Indonesia in its fight against the resistance in East Timar. Still, America could make amends by persuading Jakarta to end the fighting in Timar and negotiate the territory's- independence. I am hopeful that with growing support in the US Congress and Senate, there will be a change in official American attitudes.

What do you think of suggestions that East Timor should become an autonomous state associated with Indonesia but preserving its Portuguese cultural ties?

I think the people of East Timar will firmly reject such an idea. They are determined to fight (for independence] to the end. They want to be independent at all costs. The proposal is ingenuous when you consider that 200,000 Timorese have lost their lives for independence. The people of East Timar know the Indonesians too well to want anything more to do with them .

What is your assessment of current Portuguese and United Nations diplomatic efforts-or lack of them-aimed at solving the East Timor Problem?

I think they are more hopeful since Secretary of State George Shultz met in July with (Indonesian Foreign Minister] Kusumaatmadja Mochtar. Portugal too is renewing efforts, but I don't think anything can be really achieved without first consulting the people of East Timar. There are three parties to this problem-Portugal, Indonesia and the Timorese people. I think the United Nations should try to persuade Indonesia to let the UN send a delegation into East Tim or. The UN should go into the mountains of Timar and talk to the people. I think such a move would be possible because last year during the cease-fire

between Fretilin and Indonesian troops there were talks between the two sides in Tim or.

Are you a supporter of Fretilin? I support Fretilin as a symbol of national resistance against

Indonesia. I don't know if they are communist or not. But I believe that after so many years of illegal occupation by the Indonesian troops, the people of East Timar want nothing more to do with Indonesia because their experience has been so bad.

TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 13

East Timor Continued from page 13

This kind of approach to a "Working paper" raises questions of methodology and ethics and sets dangerous precedents. Should the Secretariat ignore the information supplied by the Representatives of the liberation movements and take at face­value all the propaganda supplied by the colonial powers? The role of the Special Committee on Decolonisation is to bring about the speedy decolonisation of all colonial Territories. The Committee members are entitled to receive genuine, objective information expressing the views of the colonised peoples so as to enable the Committee to better discharge its functions. I do not think that it is the role of the Secretariat to reprint official propaganda put out by the colonial power.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has not been able to resume its humanitarian work in East Timor since July 1983. That I'm aware of, the ICRC has been able to make only two prison visitations in East Timor since July 1983: one in March 1984 and a second in June this year. These ICRC prison visitations are even more restricted than its activities prior to July 1983. It has been floated around the claim that ICRC has had uninterrupted activities in the Atauro island. This has been pres,..ented as a major concession by Indonesia. It hides the fact that Atauro is only a prison island and where ICRC presence is most needed is in the mainland where major military activities occur daily. The fact is that the Indonesian military authorities do not wish and do not allow the ICRC to be witness to its brutal war of aggression against the people of East Timor

East Timar is the only case in the world where a major conflict is taking place with enormous human suffering and yet not one single international relief organisation is operating there. It is claimed that UNICEF is operating there. This is misleading because UNICEF's entire program is being handled by the Indonesian Red cross which is headed by a Brig.-General. Moreover, one of the most striking features of UNICEF/ Indonesian program there is to teach the Indonesian language to the East Timorese. In a letter to its Director General and in a statement before this Committee during its consideration of the East Timor question last year, I had the opportunity to express

" . . the only case of a major conflict without a single international relief organisation operating."

my outrage at UNICEF's involvement in spreading Indonesian language in East Timor. I repeat here again FRETILIN's firm objection to UNICEF and to any other international organisation working with the Indonesian Red Cross.

The International Committee of the Red Cross is still prevented from resuming its activities in East Timor as provided for in the Geneva Conventions-relief assistance; prison visitations; protection of civilian populations. And all this should be carried out without restrictions of any sort. For more than a year now, we are told that negotiations are under way between the ICRC and the Indonesian authorities and that soon ICRC would resume its activities in East Timor. Yet, more than a year has elapsed and the people of East Timor are still without a single foreign doctor, without an ICRC presence. Someone is lying to us-the Indonesian authorities or the ICRC. The ICRC must share the blame and responsibility in this gross betrayal and

deceit of the Geneva Conventions since it has not told us in no uncertain terms why it is not operating in East Timor. ICRC has allowed itself to be used by the Indonesian military authorities in misleading the rest of the world.

Indonesian expansion is condemned Jose Ramos Horta's statement concludes with the following remarks on Indonesia's expansionist policies:

Indonesia militaristic and expansionist policies are not directed only against East Timor. The situation in other parts of our region is becoming more and more volatile, ready to explode. Border violations, military incursions and attacks against a neighbouring· country, persecution of Melanesian

" . . East Timor is the deterrence against further Indonesian expansionism. . . "

people, monstrous transmigration schemes designed to replace one ethnic group by another-this is the explosive scenario in our region. Unless the international community takes the necessary actions to preempt an lndoneseian military adventure, the military men in Jakarta will push for military solutions to resolve their pressing economic, political and demographic problems. Today, East Timor is the only deterrence against further Indonesian expansionism because the Indonesian army is bogged down in a costly war there. The international community must therefore provide the people of East Timor all the moral, diplomatic and material support needed for our liberation.

Jose Ramos Horta

New Zealand Labour Party rejects military ties with Indonesia The New Zealand Labour Party annual conference, held only a couple of months after the Party was returned to power with a c?nvincing maj~rity, ?as call~d on t?e government to cut military atd and halt all mtelhgence !mks with Indonesia. The resolution also rejected such links with the Philippines, and said that the demand was made as a protest against political conditions in the two countrieti (Sinar Harapan, 11 September 1984).

14 T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

Bishop of Dili calls for talks with Fretilin Mgr Carlos Filipe Belo , Bishop of Dili, was recently interviewed by Indonesian journalists in an attempt to refute interviews he gave

recently to the foreign press. The following extracts are from Tempo, I September.

What are your impressions after working three years as Bishop of Dili1 and travelling about in East Timor?

Leninist ideology and don't want to accept the fact of integration. Would it not be a waste of time to talk with them?

First of all, everything is by the grace of God. God works within the heart so that people can know His path. I have seen the pastors and the ordinary people working very hard in their respective regions . I have also seen that everyone in East Timor has joined the Catholic Church . They see things through the Church, they get protection . They feel that we are close to them .

I don 't know whether they are really Marxists. I have not yet made any analysis about that. Some of them have asked to be baptised , for instance when there's a marriage. This year, though , there haven't been any requests of this nature.

Do people feel there are difficulties now so that they ask the Church for protection?

Would the negotiations you refer to take place within the context of East Timor being the 27th province of the Indonesian Republic?

There aren't difficulties, but there are things lacking ( kekurangan) .

What things are lacking? People want the freedom to go to the market, to the rice

fields , to the gardens and to the regions . If people living in the kecamatan-kecamatan (sub-district centres) were able to move around, their social and economic living conditions would be better.

The reality is that the people of East Timor want peace . They want development. Self-determination as demanded by Fretilin is difficult. So, let's just think about building for the future of East Timor. To do this , the government will have to be able to win the hearts and minds of the people.

1Mgr Belo, in fact , became the Bishop, or more correctly, the Apostolic Administrator of Dili , in May 1983. TAPOL

But th~ government provides many facilities to help the people, doesn't it?

Yes, the government provides facilities to help the people. But the important thing is that they should be able to feel that this development is for them, and in order for them to be able to enjoy it. People here want to live quiet lives. What they need is a quiet life. This is important .

What steps do you think need to be taken now? I think there should be talks with Fretilin again . They need to

talk with community leaders, with Church representatives, in order to create a tranquil situation. And I am willing to act as intermediary.

But their leaders, such as Xanana Gusmao, adhere to Marxist-

Seniinarists write to MA WI president The following are extracts from a letter sent by students of the Seminary at Dare on the outskirts of Dili to the President of MAW I, the Indonesian Bishops Conference, who visited East Timar in January this year on the invitation of Mgr Belo, acting Bishop of Dili. There are 21 students at the Seminary, taught by three priests and a brother. Seminary students return to their districts during their holidays and enjoy the confidentiality of the people, so can provide a link between people in outlying parts and the church in Dili. This letter was written soon after the students had returned to Dare from their Christmas break:

Constant killings You, Bishop, will be able to see and hear for yourself what is the situation of East Tim or, especially in the trouble spots where constant killings occur. This can be seen by the increase in the number of In­donesian military units with their heavy military arms, bomber planes, and tanks that are now spread into every corner . of East Timor. Apart from this almost on every occasion a misunderstanding will arise from among the Indonesian military who suspect people in urban areas of spreading unfounded rumours. This always brings with it news of suffering for many families. Such has happened in Lospalos, Viqueuque, Ainaro and Jumalai where young children are burnt in a fire or grab­bed from their parents to be cut up like ani­mals before their parents' eyes. And or­phaned children are taken away at knife point. The military, perhaps because of the anger in their hearts, do not seem to have a sense of humanity in them.

***** In this situation which is new to the

people of this small island, parents are threatened with guns that there will be great hardships for the whole family unless they surrender their young, school-age daughters to be raped. There are also some women brought to courrnot to be tried, but because it provides an occasion to per­form unholy acts upon them.

Boys and men forced into battle One action that now critically threatens the people of Tim or, both in the city and in the mountains is the problem of the present military operation. For now they are taking boys and men aged 12 to 50 to join in the fighting - marched off into the forests without any weapons. In addition, they have to move ahead of the battle front with the military behind them. Why do ordinary citizens have to be forced into battle with­out any weapons?

T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

Missionaries being persecuted Finally about what is happening to the mis­sionaries of this Diocese of Dili. Lately our missionaries in a number of parishes are pushed around aggressively and their pas­toral work is being stopped by the army who suspect and accuse them of doing things to help Fretilin. But in fact all they are doing is in accordance with what can be found in the Bible. In this manner the army breaks into the houses of priests and searches through all that belongs to the parish.

The letter asks the MA WI president to tell the Bishops , priests and Catholics of In­donesia about the situation in East Timor and "to pray for us and where possible bring about a just and peaceful solution for the sake of humanity in East Timor". Taken from Asian Bureau Australia News­letter, May 1984.

15

Timorese women reject birth control programme

Lydia Moita, an East Timorese refugee in Lisbon, answered questions recently about birth control programmes in East Timor. The interview was conducted in writing by Mariet Peeters of the Women 's Group of the Dutch Indonesia Committee.

Are traditional methods of contraception used in East Timor? Yes. They include turning of the uterus and the taking of

herbs in liquid form or neat , or plants used for local application . But contraception has never been widely practised because Timorese families by tradition maintain a high birth rate .

What are the contraceptives propagated by the Indonesians? They propagate the use of the pill, injections and

contraceptive sheaths (condoms) as well as intra-uterine devices (IUD) . They also make use of surgical methods and X-ray. The method they propagate most vigorously is the Depo Provera injection.

What kind of women respond to birth-control propaganda by the Indonesians?

Only women of the upper classes. Among the Chinese , there are young, single women who accept sterilisation.

Have there been cases of women being sterilised without their knowledge, for instance, during surgical operation?

Yes. The majority of these cases occurred during the first five years after the Indonesian invasion .

What means do the Indonesians use to propagate birth control under their family planning programme?

They use television, the radio and posters in the streets, as well as groups of so-called "dynamisers" who go round encouraging people to practise birth control.

Is pressure used, or do they try to entice women by offering gifts? Pressure isn't used openly, but Timorese people regard the

birth control campaign as a method of reducing the Timorese to people living in reservations, like animals.

Where and how are contraceptives distributed? They are distributed free of charge in maternity hospitals, by

midwives and at birth control centres by groups of "dynamisers". There was an attempt to get men to accept sterilisation by means of X-ray but there was a lot of resistance to this.

East Timar:

What is the attitude of Timorese women to the birth control programme?

They don 't accept it. Even before the invasion, very few people practised traditional methods of birth-control. And they don't like western methods because they say that pills and injections are for sick people and fertility is not a disease . In any case, the Timorese people defend their right to give birth to children to compensate for the many people who have died since the invasion .

Resettlement villages to be fortified

The Indonesian occupation forces in East Timor are cur­rently engaged in building what are officially described as "guided villages as bases for resistance" (desa binaan pangkal perlawanan) throughout the country. Aswis­warmo, the Secretary-General of the Department of the Interior, revealed this plan after a recent visit to East Timor. It is, he said, a "gigantic project" (proyek raksasa) as altogether 200 of these "guided villages" will have to be set up in order "to reinforce stability and security, and facilitate all aspects of development activity" . (Topik, 18 July 1984.)

This suggests that the military are reinforcing their counter-insurgency strategy by str,engthening the system of strategic villages known up till now in Indonesian parlance as daerah pemukiman (resettlement areas). This may mean re-locating some, if not all of the pemukiman as well as strengthening their perimeter fences . The new plan clearly affects all the present centres of Indonesian population control which have always been estimated to amount to between 150 and 200.

The Topik report means that Indonesia's military operations since the August 1983 offensive was launched have confronted the continuing strength of Fretilin support networks right in the heart of the controlled population centres in Indonesian-held territory. (For a detailed discussion of this, see Budiardjo and Liem, The War Against East Timor, 1984, Zed Press, chapters 3 -4.)

Unfinished Business How Fretilin recovered from near extinction . . . conditions under Indonesian occupation . . . cynical diplomacy. (Southeast Asia, Chronicle No. 94)

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16 TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

Australia's seabed talks with Indonesia are illegal

During a visit by Australia's Foreign Minister, Bill Hayden, to Lisbon in early September, Australia was told that its negotiations with Indonesia on the seabed boundary between Australia and East Timor are illegal. The seabed talks have been imbued with a sense of urgency since the recent discovery of substantial oil deposits in the area (see "The 'Timar Gap': Oil and Trouble" in TAPOL Bulietin No 63, May 1984). Portugal is still the administering power in East Timar, Gama told Hayden, and Australia is in breach of international law by entering into negotiations with Indonesia.

Just prior to the visit, Indonesian Foreign Minister Mochtar Kusumaatmaja accused Hayden of unwarranted interference by presuming to mediate between Indonesia and Portugal, while General Murdani publicly told Bill Hayden-yet again-to "mind your own business". These outbursts only reveal the jittery nature of Indonesia's responses to any international talks about East Timar.

Portugal reiterates support for self-determination At a dinner for UN envoy, Rafeeudin Ahmed,* just prior to Hayden's visit, Portugal's Foreign Minister, Jaime Gama stated: "There will be no solution to the East Timar question if the necessary conditions are not created to give the people of East Timar the opportunity to exercise their right to self­determination and protect their religious, language and cultural identity" (Diario de Noticias, and Sinar Harapan, 7 September). Hayden refused to say whether a similar view had been expressed to him during-his talks with Jaime Gama, but it has become clear since earlier this year that President Eanes has insisted on the Portuguese government upholding the principle of self-determination. While he does not exercise executive powers, the President is in a position to veto any Portuguese government move in another direction.

Gama also told Hayden he believed his country would be in a stronger bargaining position with Indonesia when it gains entry into the European Economic Commission, probably in January 1986. He said that the East Timar issue "was growing within the European Parliament and that once Portugal was a member of the EEC, the issue would be assessed differently" (The Australian, 10 September).

But what of Hayden's views during his Lisbon visit? He has been variously quoted as speaking of the need to draw the East

Slide-show

Now Available

On: * * repression and

militarisation in Indonesia

* * East Timor

* * West Papua

Timorese into the consultations while at the same time attacking Fretilin as a "beleaguered" force. The Portuguese daily, Diario de Noticias even quoted Hayden as saying that no peace could be assured in East Timor as long as the people are denied their right to self-determination. But Jose Ramos Horta, who went to Lisbon to lobby on Fretilin's behalf before the Hayden visit, said he doubted whether Hayden has the interests of the East Timorese at heart. "His concern is to get rid of the issue" (Weekend Australian, 8-9 September) . Horta also said he had met presidential aides several times to discuss East Timar and had been assured that Portugal would stand by its commitment to East Timor's self-determination.

*Appointed by the UN Secretary General to assist with consultations on East Timor.

REVIEW

BARNES (Robert), Whaling Off Lembata: The effects of a de­velopment project on an Indonesian community, IWGIA Docu­ment 48, IWGIA, Fiolstrade 10, DK-1171 Copenhagen K, May 1984, 32pp, maps, pictures, bibliography.

The development project described is that of the UN Food and Agriculture organisation undertaken in Lamalera on the island of Lambata (also called Lomblen) March 1973---November 1975.

Lembata has the only traditional sperm whaling industry in Southeast Asia, a means of livelihood mentioned in Portuguese documents as early as 1629. The main purpose of the project was to modernise this whaling tradition. The author describes the project in detail from its first initiative in 1969 until the end of 1982. To begin with, the moving force behind the project was the Catholic mission.

"The FAO project and its failures are still topics of discussion in Lamalera. The people feel that the technology was unsuited to their situation, and they express puzzlement about the aims of the programme. The benefits of the whaling they regard as having been only temporary." (p. 28). Above all, the people in Lamalera have been bitter about the whaling boat used in the project. This whaling boat was transferred to Larantuka where it still was in 1982.

Finngeir Hiorth, Oslo

72 slides, colour and black-and-white Price: £12.50 plus postage:

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TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 17

I

Death squads

The killings continue The Indonesian press may not publish reports about death-squad killings which still continue. But reports like the following occasionally appear:

Many people who have been branded "black-magic practitioners" are in fear of their lives in East Java. By the end of Au­gust no fewer than 15 men branded in this way have turned up at the Jogjakarta Legal Aid Institute (LBH) asking for protection .

Tempo (8 September) reports the de­tails of one such fugitive named Abdul Gani whose house was broken into in the middle of the night, in the village of Curah Kalak, Situbondo district. Two masked men tried to drag him off but he managed to escape. Although he shouted for help, none of his neighbours dared to venture out because the whole village lived in fear following the disappearance of another vil­lager, Nurhasim, whose body was disco­vered on 4 August, full of wounds . Gani believes that the men who tried to capture him were also responsible for Nurhasim's death; at his funeral, Gani was warned that he was next on the list, and told that his life would be safe if he paid Rp 200,000 in pro­tection money.

Similar events have been reported to the LBH. from other parts of East Java. One group of masked men wearing army uniform who were questioned by the police about a killing, claimed that the man they murdered had been a black-magic prac­titioner. In West Java too, reports Tempo, there have been many killings for the same reason. Fifty victims were killed in the year up to last June in the district of Tasik­malaya , of whom 22 were from one sub­district alone , the sub-district of Cikalong. All, writes Tempo, were people acknow­ledged locally as community leaders .

When LBH lawyers visited the army command in Situbondo recently to seek as­surances that such incidents would stop, all they were told by the commander was that people regarded as black-magicians were indeed now being listed, "not in order to be bumped off but to be given guidance", the officer said . Five extra years for using Marxist expres­sions in court A man being tried for murder at the district court in Samarinda, East Kalimantan, was given an extra heavy sentence because he used what the judge called "Marxist ter­minology" in his defence plea. The pro­secutor in the trial of Siswanto had asked the court to pass down a sentence of ten years, but after hearing words like "materialism" and "dialectics" in Sis­wanto's statement to the court, the judges took strong exception to the "communist flavour" of his defence and decided that a far heavier sentence was warranted. In ad­dition, since the court was led to believe that Siswanto's defence plea had been writ­ten with the assistance of Siswanto's co­prisoners, the public prosecutor's office

18

The family of Nurhasim, killed in August by a death squad.

has now asked the East Kalimantan milit­ary command to carry out investigations at the prison to discover how such a thing could have happened.

But the Siswanto trial merits attention for another reason. The defendant made no secret of the fact that he murdered a man named Soetrisno because he was known to be a "recidivist". Siswanto told the court that he had committed the crime as part of the campaign to fight crime. "I did not do it for personal reasons but to help establish law and order and in re-

Siswanto in court.

sponse to the government's appeal to the people to help fight crime". He told the court he considered that he should be treated as a hero, not punished, for re­sponding to the government's appeal. The flaw in Siswanto's otherwise impeccable logic is that he is not a member of the Armed Forces, so killing "known crimi­nals" becomes a crime, not a deed to safeguard security. Source: Tempo, 15 September 1984.

TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984

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Indonesia's troubled image

A Sinar Harapan journalist in London , Suharjono, has recently expressed deep an­xiety about criticism of Indonesia in the British press (Sinar Harapan, 1 September 1984). When he arrived in London not long ago, he was apparently shocked to find not only uncensored reports in the mainstream press but even to discover that books harshly critical of the military regime Were being published and sold here .

In a tale of woes several columns long he accused papers like the Times, the Daily Telegraph and the Financial Times of writ­ing "pure sensation", basing themselves on such unreliable sources as Reuters and AFP. Nor was he at all happy about the BBC World Service which was hell-.bent on giving incorrect (i.e. unofficial) accounts of what goes on in West Papua and East Timor. The AFP's interview of the Bishop of Dili , to take one example , was simply a piece of anti-Indonesian propaganda be­cause the Bishop had found not a single nice thing to say about Indonesian rule in East Timor.

Suharjono then turned his wrath ·on TAPOL which is now more vicious than ever in the attacks and insults it heaps on the Indonesian regime; worse still, it has the nerve to send its dangerous publica­tions freely to people in Indonesia . He listed the book titles T APOL is now pub­lishing and selling (and even translated them into Indonesian), though no. doubt his intention was not to encourage SH readers to write for copies of such subver­sive literature .

Finally, the journalist complained bit­terly of the "do-nothing" attitude of the In­donesian embassy who reserve their bouts of frenzied activity for occasional visits of high officials from Jakarta or national day celebrations. This was a remark that could not go unchallenged. Two days later, Ira­wan Abidin, former information officer at the London embassy, was defending him­self vigorously ·in the columns of Sinar Harapan (3 September). Had he not spo­ken to the editor of the Guardian and a journalist in the Times and managed to get "long articles" in to refute baseless reports which they had published in their ignor­ance? Had he not even put a stop to the

·publication of articles by Carmel Budiardjo in the journal of the · Iranian Embassy? (Not that she has ever written for that pub­lication , mind you. Mr Abidin should have tackled the problem at source, for the Muslimedia agency is still · quite happy to publish her writings.)

Then, said the unfortunate Mr Abidin , there was the occasion when he went to ,Scotland where he was "attacked" by Am­nesty international. Here too, we can fill in the details . His venture up north to .address the Bali Society at St Andrews University turned out to be a rowdy occasion, for stu-

Britain • ID

dents there had read his rejoinder (all 28 lines of it) in the Guardian to the Budiardjo article on West Papua and had come to the conclusion that here was man who needed to be challenged. Later Mr Abidin pleaded by letter with the St An­drews University Students Union to discip­line the student who wrote an "offensive" article about Indonesia in the Union jour-

nal. But even if they had understood his convoluted reasoning and rather odd En­glish , they were hardly likely to bow to the kind of interference Indonesian editors have to put up with .

As for T APOL, we can only thank Suharjono for giving us so much publicity right 'where we'd like it most , in Indonesia .

The tight-rope existence of the Indonesian preSs as depicte(I in a Sinar Harapan cartoon, 11 February 1984. No wonder the editors decided not to publish a letter from TAPOL responding to Irawan Abidin's explanations.

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T APOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984 19

Water will erode the stones The poet and playwright Rendra, a central figure of Indonesian cultural life, has been prevented sin~e 1978 from appe~ring in public to read his poems or have his plays produced. The following poem, translated by Max Lane is an example of his recent writings and is taken from Inside Indonesia, Australia, No 2, May 1984.

Poem of an angry person

Because we eat roots And flour piles up in your warehouses . .. Because we live all cramped up And your space is so abundant . .. So we are not allies.

Because we are soiled And you are shiny bright . . . Because we feel suffocated And you lock the door . . . So we distrust you.

Because we are abandoned on the streets And you own all the shade . .. Because we endure floods And you party on pleasure boats . .. So we don't lik e you.

Because we are silenced And you never stop nagging . .. Because we are threatened And you use violence against us . .. So we say to you NO.

Continued from page 9

May I ask you an even harder question? Will these refugees ever go back, and if so, when?

That is a hard question! I hope and pray that those who would be at risk when they go back will be given political asylum. There are quite a number among these refugees who I feel should be given political asylum. There are others particularly out in the bush areas who do not want to leave their ground and village. I think they , eventually, should be allowed just to go back to their villages. But when? The people in the bush say when it is safe for them to go back . But I hope they won't be sent back before it is time.

Do you think it is justified that this be kept as an internal matter between Papua New Guinea and Indonesia? Or do you feel that deeper involvement of the United Nations in interviewing,

Because we may not choose And you are free to.make plans . .. Because we have only sandals And you are free to use rifles . . . Because we must be polite And you have jails . .. So NO and NO to you.

Because we are the current of the river And you are the stones without heart . .. So the water will erode away the stones.

processing and assistance is warranted? I do. I think it is beyond an internal matter between two

countries now because quite a number are refugees. They are fleeing something to come here. They are asking for refuge. I would very much like to see the United Nations involved. It is too much for the mission and it is too much for the government to look after them, but the United Nations can do it. And ihhere is to be any repatriation, I would like to see the United Nations involved in that.

If there are attempts to forcibly repatriate people, what will you do?

If there are people whom I believe, from my close knowledge of the situation, are genuine refugees, and if there are attempts to forcibly return them, then I will state my objection very strongly and very publicly.

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20 TAPOL Bulletin No. 65. September 1984